Yonhap has an interesting article published about the different incentives being offered in South Korea for families to have 3 or more children in order to improve the nation’s birthrate:

The government spent more than 101.6 trillion won from 2006 to 2016 to encourage people to have more babies, though it was not enough to boost the low birthrate. The government said it has set aside more than 22.4 trillion won this year to help raise the country’s birthrate.

“It’s fair to say financial incentives are part of South Korea’s efforts to raise the low birthrate,” said Kye Bong-oh, professor of sociology at Kookmin University and a member of the Population Association of Korea.

Still, he said it remains to be seen how effective South Korea’s birth promotion policy will be.

Kang said she feels relieved that her county offers 10 million won in incentives to promote birth.

Kang’s view was echoed by Lee Su-min who is entitled to receive 47 million won from the southeastern county of Changnyeong and the central government over the next five years for her fourth baby.

“Financial incentives are of help to my family, as my husband is the sole breadwinner,” Lee said by phone from Changnyeong.

The southern South Korean island of Wando also offers 5 million won as a lump sum and another 15 million won in installments over three years for those who have a fifth baby. So far, there is only one recipient, but he declined to give an interview, citing privacy.  [Yonhap]

You can read more at the link.

Yes it's 'Bandemonium' but Ban Ki-moon's critics & enemies need no encouragement to take this 'slippery eel' to task https://t.co/zwMUE45c1a pic.twitter.com/WXO2nnKFSv

— Noon in Korea (@AllNewsKorea) January 14, 2017

It seems the domestic political situation in China would force them to take action against any blockade of their artificial islands in the South China Sea.  China’s advanced ballistic missile capability is how they would likely respond.  Before any blockade is called for I hope people fully understand the risks:

Rex Tillerson, the former Exxon chief, didn’t get where he is by being nice to China. When Beijing tried to force his company to abandon a gas exploration project in the waters off Vietnam in 2008, ExxonMobil showed it the finger. BP, Chevron, ConocoPhillips, and several others caved to Chinese pressure. ExxonMobil is still there, drilling on a Vietnamese license in waters also claimed by China.

Is Tillerson about to do the same on behalf of the United States? On Wednesday, the secretary of state-designate seemed ready to give China the finger again. He called on the incoming Trump administration to deny China access to the seven artificial island bases it has built in the southern part of the South China Sea.

In response to a question about whether he would support a more aggressive posture in the South China Sea, he told his Senate confirmation hearing, “We’re going to have to send China a clear signal that, first, the island-building stops and, second, your access to those islands also is not going to be allowed.” The jaws of the Asia policy-watching community hit the floor.  [Foreign Policy]

You can read the rest at the link, but the author thinks Tillerson may have misspoke and meant blockading any action by the Chinese to build a base on the Scarborough Shoal which would be less dangerous, but still quite a risky strategy to implement if China is committed to forcing the issue.  It seems it would be a tough sell to the American people to risk war with China over the Scarborough Shoal.

The other wild card in all of this is what if President Duerte in the Philippines cuts a deal with China to let them build on the shoal which is claimed by the Philippines?

It will be interesting to see if the prosecutors have the evidence to prove their case because Samsung and the women behind the ROK Presidential scandal Choi Soon-sil as well as President Park Geun-hye are denying everything:

Special prosecutors on Monday requested an arrest warrant for Lee Jae-yong, Samsung Group’s de facto leader, on charges of bribery, embezzlement and perjury in connection with an influence-peddling scandal that led to President Park Geun-hye’s impeachment.

Lee, vice chairman of Samsung Electronics Co., is accused of giving or promising to give some 43 billion won (US$36.3 million) worth of bribes to Park’s jailed friend Choi Soon-sil in return for the state-run pension fund’s backing of a merger of two Samsung affiliates, the team’s spokesman Lee Kyu-chul told a regular press briefing.

Samsung signed a 22 billion won consulting contract in August 2015 with a Germany-based firm owned by the woman who is at the center of the scandal and allegedly sent the company billions of won, which was used to fund her daughter’s equestrian training, according to prosecutors. The money that was originally promised to be handed over was included in the amount deemed as bribes, Lee, the spokesman, said.

Some 20.4 billion won the group donated to two nonprofit foundations, allegedly linked to Choi, was also viewed as a kickback. It was the largest amount given by any business group to the organizations.

Prosecutors suspect Samsung supported Choi in return for the National Pension Service (NPS) approving the contested merger of two Samsung subsidiaries on July 17, 2015.  [Yonhap]

You can read more at the link.

This bankruptcy of the light rail in Uijongbu is completely unsurprising because of how unnecessary it was.  It is very easy to get around Uijongbu via the bus system that made the light rail a redundant form of transportation that would never meet the expected daily usage rate that was projected.  According to the article the U-Line needs 118,000 people a day to ride it to break even and last year they only had 35,000 a day:

The Uijeongbu Light Rail Transit Company filed bankruptcy to the Seoul Central District Court on Wednesday after just four and a half years, as the light rail failed to draw enough commuters and was insolvent for years.

The board members of the light rail company unanimously agreed on Wednesday to file for bankruptcy after its debt rose beyond 240 billion won ($200 million) at the end of last year.

The light rail trains, smaller in size and shorter than subway trains, run on the Uijeongbu Line, or U Line, in Uijeongbu, Gyeonggi. The railway stretches 11.1 kilometers (6.9 miles) from Balgok Station to Tapseok Station. The light rail opened on July 1, 2012, and was expected to draw nearly 80,000 commuters a day in its first year, according to figures obtained by the company from a consulting agency.

Only a daily average of about 10,000 used the light rail on its first year, and by the end of last year, the daily reached some 35,000. To break even, the business needed about 118,000 people daily.

“The company needs to make 45 billion won a year to operate the railway, but it’s scraping in only 15 billion won a year on average,” said an employee of the company.

Five financial institutes, including KB Kookmin Bank, lent some 352 billion won as operating funds to the Uijeongbu Light Rail Transit Company. The group sent an official letter to the company on Jan. 2, requesting that it shut down the business.  [Joong Ang Ilbo]

You can read more at the link, but the Uijongbu city government is vowing to keep the light rail running which means the public will be picking up the annual operating losses.

Old movie poster for the 1964 classic "Red Scarf," directed by Shin Sang-ok and starring Choi… https://t.co/h8yMcgAjOQ

— The Marmot's Feed (@rjkoehler) January 12, 2017

Here is the latest action the Pentagon has taken in response to any near term launch of a North Korean ICBM:

The U.S. Pentagon has deployed a giant floating radar in anticipation of an intercontinental missile launch from North Korea, CNN reported Wednesday.

The sea-based X-band radar was deployed in response to North Korean leader Kim Jong-un’s claim in his New Year’s address on Jan. 1 that preparations for an intercontinental ballistic missile have “reached the final stage.”

It has a range of 4,800 km and is capable of monitoring most of China as well as the Korean Peninsula from Okinawa.  [Chosun Ilbo]

You can read more at the link, but the SBX is used to support the US military’s Ground-based Midcourse Defense (GMD) system that has interceptors in Alaska and California that for defense against a limited attack from North Korea.

Yonhap has a good interview published with an aerospace engineer that outlines what North Korea’s testing of the ICBM capability would likely look like:

John Schilling, an aerospace engineer with expertise in the North’s missile programs, said that the North’s ICBM test could involve a missile variant of the space launch vehicle Unha or the road-mobile KN-08 missile or its upgraded version KN-14.

A test of the Unha rocket fitted with a reentry vehicle large enough for a nuclear warhead would likely work, but it would put “an end to any pretense or hope of a peaceful space program,” the expert said.  (……..)

Schilling also noted the first American ICBM, the SM-65 Atlas, failed 26 seconds into its maiden flight and eight tests were conducted over the course of a year, with only two fully successful. The first all-up test of the competing SM-68 Titan was even shorter, exploding on the launch pad, he said.

“We should expect North Korean ICBMs to follow a similar path — a series of early failures leading to an operational capability even with a spotty testing record,” the expert said.

The North is unlikely to conduct an ICBM test as frequently as it did with the intermediate-range Musudan missile that was tested eight times between April and October last year, he said.

“Pyongyang can afford to keep up that pace in a full-scale ICBM development program. Its aerospace industry hasn’t demonstrated the production capacity needed to test an ICBM every month,” he said. ” One test every three to six months would be more realistic, at least in the long run, so this is not a process that will be completed in 2017.”

Should the North decide to test the KN-08 or KN-14, it is expected to use existing launch sites, rather than a mobile launcher, in order to reduce chances of failure and to learn as much as possible from the failures, he said.  [Yonhap]

You can read more at the link.